Those that are depressed will undergo pharmacologic treatment with an SSRI, if they agree, and be reassessed at 2 and 6 months for improvement. Patients who do not respond are referred for psychiatric therapy. The primary outcome of our study is the combined rate of prespecified morbidity and mortality at 18 months between two groups: depressed subjects agreeing to treatment and depressed subjects not agreeing to treatment. Prespecified morbidities include rates of 1) cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events, 2) infections, 3) vascular access complications, and 4) death. These were selected based on prior studies suggesting that depression increases cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events, suppresses the immune system, and up-regulates coagulation factors and platelet aggregation. , , , , , ,